By Associate Professor John Mickel, School of Justice, QUT
Wayne Delaforce, a PHD student from QUT, has developed a public policy model which has the potential to lead to better development of public policy. The model has been explained and applied to State parliament, business and education in a series of forums across the State.
In May this year, the model was the subject of discussion at the Queensland Parliament attended by the secretarial staff and some members with QUT Academics, Associate Professor John Mickel, Professor Kerry Carrington, Professor Mark Lauchs and Wayne Delaforce.
The model can help with the development of public policy if applied to the developing legislative committee system of the Parliament. This is particularly beneficial in a one house parliament where legislation needs to be placed under scrutiny before being passed into legislation. There is a tendency in a one house parliament for the Executive to try to rush legislation through the parliament without proper consideration. In a twenty four hour news cycle, governments are pressured for a response to a problem. There is a risk government will enact legislation in an environment where the problem has not been properly identified or where a policy solution has been generated without adequate research and analysis.
The model provides members and their staff with key points to identify for the questioning of each stage of the legislation. The model also helps business and community agencies identify where they can be of assistance to the Government or alternatively where they are able to identify defects in the policy development. This means business and community sectors can influence the political process in a meaningful way by insisting on a carefully thought through public policy model.
This model was recently part of the discussion at a school principals meeting forum with Catholic Schools. Schools are often called upon to respond to the issues around societal changes, technology and, in the case of catholic schools, to the social justice issues which are debated.
Matters under discussion at the recent forum included the needs of the poor, the need to take additional migrants and refugees in to the schools, the issues of cyber bullying and how schools should respond to this as well as how catholic schools should respond in an increasingly secular environment. All of these issues, as well as the recent Naplan results and their impact on schools, can leave any principal bewildered for an adequate response.
The model developed by QUT academics offered the participants a logical insight into the way forward.It simply highlights that for different schools there are different starting points – the school at Kingaroy may not have the same urgency with its response to migrant students as the Catholic school in Woodridge.
The Naplan results start at a different perspective in the model. For many schools their starting point may be evaluation of the results and the corrective actions which may be required.
So the policy analysis model has a high level of adaptability for all types of organisations. If used correctly, it will lead to better policy development and outcomes in those organisations and may provoke a better formulation of public policy.
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